John Slattery Made a Drunken Bet That He Could Cast Philip Seymour Hoffman in His First Movie

Most first-time directors don’t have the good fortune of casting Oscar-winning actors in their debut feature. But most first-time directors aren't John Slattery, the Mad Men star who previously had only directed five episodes of his AMC series, and who had an attitude so brazen and booze-abetted about casting his inaugural feature that even his Mad Men character Roger Sterling would be impressed.

After the Sundance Film Festival premiere of his gritty first film God’s Pocket, which is based on a novel by Pete Dexter, Slattery spoke about drawing both Philip Seymour Hoffman and award-winning cinematographer Lance Acord, who frequently works with Spike Jonze and Sofia Coppola, to the project. “Everyone’s first question was, ‘How the hell did you get Lance Accord to shoot a movie?’ Slattery said during an audience Q&A.

“Lance claims that I bet him. We were having lunch and maybe had a few drinks and he claims that he said, ‘If you can get Phil Hoffman to make this movie, I will shoot it.’“ To laughs, Slattery added, “But I don’t remember that.”

Hoffman, who also ended up producing the film, said that he was attracted to the project because of John’s dedication to it. “You try to get involved with projects that are personal. This was obviously personal to John, so that kind of bled through the whole shoot. You kind of get on his passion train. You show up and you are exposed and you are vulnerable and you are who you are. And John let that happen. And that is what you see in the movie. A lot of trust.”